Highly Commended Story - A Letter From The Future

“A Letter From The Future” by Bakir Dariya, NIS CBD Pavlodar, Kazakhstan, is the Highly Commended story in the senior category of the first biannual Short Story Contest 2020.

Dariya is a student of 9th grade at NIS in Pavlodar, Kazakhstan. She is a very open and positive person actively participating in school activities. Presently, Dariya is involved in a project in English, studying descriptive language in writing. In her spare time, she likes to draw, dance and play the national instrument - dombra. Most of all, she likes to watch TV series, anime in fantasy genre, read detective books and spend time with friends. Dariya would like to do more creative work related to dancing and music and plans to link her future career with it.

A Letter From The Future

To the past

13.06.2142

Can you prevent the mistakes of the past? For me, no, because if there had been such chance, there would not be this chaos now. Why do you think I'm so determined to say this? All because the time I live in is catastrophic.

My name is Noorah, I'm 16 years old. I live with my family in Kazakhstan, Almaty. It is now 2142 the era of "Recovery". This year is named after the restoration of the Earth after the devastating ecological disaster caused by our ancestors. Massive pollution of the Earth with plastic, toxic substances, chemical fertilizers and, in general, air and ocean pollution has led to irreparable consequences. That is, every year, the amount of garbage and waste increased rapidly. Due to the resulting tons of emissions, many species of innocent animals were subjected to extinction. The entire ocean was almost filled with waste, as more and more factories were built. People began to forget the feeling of clean and fresh air. The Earth had never been in such a terrible state. It seemed that it could not be worse.

However, the year 2112 was the greatest blow to humanity. Without preventing problems of the environment, people were subjected to mass death due to poisoning, diseases and floods and other disasters, caused by global warming.

Women lost the ability to give birth to healthy children. Unfortunately, this has affected genes and is being transmitted now. Most children were born disabled or with various diseases. Such children were unviable and did not live a year. According to my parents, they were the only and last relatively healthy generation. Consequently, there is now left a third of the population of what it was before (from 15 billion to 5 billion). In my country, too, there was a sharp decline in demographics mainly due to diseases and toxic substances in products. Since then, humans lost faith in ability to leave descendants, until robots appeared.

They were first created when I was born. The experiment was a success and robots have a huge demand in our time. These robots could carry children with the properties of a female uterus. With the help of the parents’ genetic information, new-borns had the same traits and qualities as their parents. At first, only the rich could buy them, but later, due to mass production, everyone could afford them. As for me, I was born naturally. There aren't many like me on the planet. Many people say that I was incredibly lucky, but to some extent I do not agree with them.

All my peers were born by robots. They are the first generation of this experiment. We call them Nemo. They excel in their speed, intelligence, and endurance. At the beginning, the Nemo were insensitive and callous. If new-born children could cry, rejoice and laugh, Nemo learned this much later. And over time, they began to experience the same feelings and emotions as people and easily merged into the human way of life.

I am a student of a high school. Our school organizes special trips where we collect garbage and help nature. Every week we hand over garbage to processing plants. In general, we try to correct what our ancestors did.

My classmates are Nemo and they surpassed me in almost everything: in academic performance, in sports, cooking, and so on. They actively help clean up the environment by coming up with new devices and inventions. They were so smart that one of them - Nemo from England at the age of 16 - came up with a principle for inventing a time machine, and it is now being actively developed. Hopefully, we will able to influence the course of the former human actions by sending agents to the past.

Of course, initially, it was difficult for me to accept that I was not gifted like them, but over time I got used to it. Since childhood, Nemo surrounded me and I got along well with them and made many friends. Not so long ago, I met Ali. He moved to Almaty with his family 2 years ago. We immediately began to get along well and it turned into a youthful love. Even though I'm not Nemo, he was able to love me for what I am. Ali and I dated for about a year. Everything was great. We loved each other, but at one point…

There was a failure in the body of the first generation of Nemo and it was found out that their health could not provide a guarantee for a long life. Gradually, this began to affect other people of my age. The symptoms were terrible. There were pains in the head, unstable temperature, frequent fainting spells, and the worst blackening of Nemo's limbs. It was all hard to watch. As it turned out, Nemo's organisms began to suffer because of the polluted ecology. Since the ecology was still in a terrible state, therefore, their organisms were not ready for heavy loads. This was determined after the very first death - the death of my classmate. We couldn't even bury him properly, because he was needed for experiments. I had to drop out of school for a while and stay on duty day and night in the hospital. It was unbearable and painful to see how people put various experiments on Nemo in order to invent an antidote. They treated them ruthlessly like toys, using their bodies to find a way out. It was a dark day when the person I loved left me. Unfortunately, Ali's body was also sent for examination. Nemo's parents were powerless against to interfere with the authorities.

Ever since Ali said goodbye to life, I've been depressed and exhausted. It was very difficult for me to lose my soul mate. For a long time, I refused to believe it. When our funny and happy moments were replayed in my head, my heart bled. I thought I couldn't handle this tragedy, but Ali always said I had to be strong under any circumstances.

Falling action

All scientists were at a dead end. Many drugs and serums were presented, but they were useless. People realized that there was no way to solve this problem and stopped producing and selling robots.

After all, everyone realized inside that robots and other equipment could not replace the natural birth. Because in the womb, the child learns to survive and find information. All his organs are also connected to the mother and he can feel all her emotions and experiences. Maybe the robots still could not give the right substances in the womb, and this could also be the cause of Nemo's death at a young age. Now it's scary to watch other generations of Nemo. As it turned out, all Nemos begin to die at 15-16. And the rest of the generations have to wait painfully for their death. Scientists assume that the Earth will be restoring for a long time, and if we do not find a way to leave descendants, the humanity may disappear...

Earlier, I mentioned creating a time machine. And this year we managed to complete the development. I am currently in London. Terrible pictures and the loss of loved ones, prompted me to write you this letter and send it to the past. I think with my story I was able to describe the future with contaminated environment. Eventually, this is the main factor of all disasters. Therefore, I ask you to pay great attention to the environment, so that there is a guarantee for a good future!

Nurlan Noorah